The Round Table

Hard to believe that I would be using a teacher-tube video as part of my all staff faculty meeting. I felt as though too much time was spent going over nuts and bolts “stuff” without the opportunity to provoke education thought and dialogue at the monthly meeting. I used a video entitled A Vision of Students Todayby Michael Wesch at Kansas University. The video was produced by college students, and is a reflection of college life and learning. After watching the video I had the staff fill out a response sheet to further the discussion.

Interestingly the reactions of staff were split into two camps; “the video left me depressed thinking about the lack of motivation of students”, and “excited about the opportunities that technology offers students of today”. The arguments of today may be the same arguments that our parents had twenty-five years ago with the advent of technology into the classroom. Many of the staff noted that college students of days gone by were often categorized as “lazy” by their counterpart workers.

Given the opportunity to watch the video again, the staff might conclude that technology was used to produce a presentation that invoked such strong response. Students responsible for enhancing their learning, making a statement, and utilizing the tools of today that reflect the changes in our society/educational realm.

Getting staff to at least acknowledge the changes in education is the first step. Doing something about it is next.